Let's argue: Gow is not fun anymore

I have been playing god of war 1 since 2005 and is till play them untill now i love the gameplay in this game more than anything else in the heat of the universe, i could survive the rest of my live playing just 5 games: GOD OF war 1;2;3; CoO; GoS; Ascension, i like how the game is never boring even the puzzles are fun to do, but Nu-Gow made it feel like it was an RPG game i recall it had quests which i don't know why, now i like the Nu-Gow combat style it's not like Greek how combat but still it's good, the Greek games put on boss fight with a giant enemy right away, not 10 years Walk holding left stick forward. All I'm saying is Santa Monica, God of war is not an RPG game don't try to be like every other game trying to be open world and that stuff.

@masterkiller103: No argument from me, God of War IV wasn't for me and I've already shared my experiences/ details on the matter.

Now do I think God of War (2018) is bad? no, it just targets a different audience, one that wants a lot of walking and talking, less options, more. . well story. It's an easy assumption that if you are one of those people 'you know the ones' that think The Last of Us is the hottest game ever; chances are you think GoW (2018) is hot shit too.

And honestly I can't knock it too harshly, Santa Monica studio was on deaths door before the game. Remember Ascension? well if you do it's worth noting the game is absolutely terrible, and let's not forget the Smash Bros clone either. SMS needed a win and that required rebranding its flagship IP to a wider audience. They made all the smart choices.

My favorites are God of War III, GoWII, & Ghost of Sparta. GoS probably takes the lead because the pacing is pitch perfect and doesn't drag. All three I think are solid 3D Slashers. Are they as good as Ninja Gaiden/ Bayonetta/ Devil May Cry at series peak? no, but still fun alternatives. If you haven't played one of them and like other 3D Slashers, you're missing out.

*Hottake* Have no intention of ever play Ragnarök due to not clicking with 2018, will be the first GoW I haven't played. More of the same is fine for those that want more 2018, it's not for me. Easiest pass of 2022.

Furthermore I beat all the Valkyries in 2018, they're not as difficult as fans claimed; I assume it's only difficult if you're use to taking the easy way out in video games, and avoid games that are considered challenging.

>Nu-Gow bad

I also don't think it's bad but i just prefer the previous ones you know not only because of the gameplay, but because Greek mythology is my favorite one, Nurse mythology is also gorgeous to be fair, The pacing of the game was good i think it deserves GoTY Award for 2018, but the blades will never be forgotten.

>Ascension is bad

This is an argument so frequent in the community that i don't understand, i get that's a prequel which usually are not so good, i honestly liked ascension i think there's some things it did better than gow3 other than the graphical phedalties, What did you think was bad about Ascension ?

>Gow Ragnarok

I'm honestly still interested in the story, especially that i watch a lot of Viking series's, I'm honestly not in it for the gameplay **** Specifically combat**** which i was looking forward to in the previous games.

>SMS tried to reach wider audience

And they forgot about they're already existing fans? Did they're plan of reaching out to more player's work out?

I don't think Ascension does a single aspect better than GoWIII.

Devil May Cry 3 is a prequel and it's the best DMC bar none, so I dunno on the prequel argument.

Ascension has a slew of problems from awful pacing, shit camera, overabundance of quicktime events (even for GoW standards), recycled enemy types, lack of enemy types, invincible enemies are poorly designed, and the new grapple feature is ass. The rage meter harbors most your attacks and combo strings and as such is pretty clunky overall.

Ascension fails because most its resources are put into a multiplayer mode and as such the SP game is built around those additions.

I can't even praise the bosses because they just copy what we've already done heavily in GoWII. I recall going back to the GoW Collection after and yeah Ascension just reuses archetypes from GoWII. . pretty lame. Except Ascension is a two hour game (three-four if you explore a lot)

The only aspect I liked about Ascension was it had some decent puzzles. It is however the worst none mobile GoW game; yep Chains of Olympus is better.

Unfortunately I never forgot Ascension or why I dislike it so, sure it's a pretty game, but graphics will only take a game so far. I recommend Ascension as much as I do Little Big Planet 3; which is not at all.

What you need to consider as well is the 3D Hack n' Slash genre is dead in the water and I say that as a fan of them. Devil May Cry V took how long to surface? and when it came out sure it's a solid game (I have some issues with it), but it doesn't sell as well as fans would hope. The genre is just not the juggernaut is use to be, namely because outside a handful no one makes these kind of games anymore because they're considered "too hard" for modern audiences, probably doesn't help that they're difficult to get done right.

Developers now prefer to mimic Dark Souls, or some other variation of ARPG; Monster Hunter is also a popular ARPG sub-genre many try to mimic, with poor results.

The years of Ninja Gaiden and Devil May Cry games are locked to history. Even Bayonetta III heavily relies of kaiju battles over its Hn'S roots, one could say they're moving away from what brought them to the dance.

I'd argue it was never fun.

• Tried to play some of GoW2 back in the day, got bored
• Tried to play GoW 2018 after all the praise, got bored

Just not for me, I guess.

Although I have no issues with prequels I'm not sure how you would put DMC 3 above DMC5. DMC5:SE is by far the best in the series.

I thought Ascension was good it just wasn't as good as GoW 3.

DMC5 is the best selling in the series we will probably see it again. Now people are trying to blend hack and slash with open world.

@RSM-HQ: I think i'm just not made for the new era of gaming, My favorite themes of games to play are just not in the the mind of the developers anymore, I still have my PS2 after all these years and I prefer to keep it than to Buy a PS5, there's no reason to play if the games aren't fun anymore, The most important aspect to me in any game is Gameplay, it comes before the story, the graphics, the content... Everything, The old era of games were a treasure, and now i hardly find any titles with theme i want.

@silentchief: I like a lot in Devil May Cry V but DMC3 is must more straight forward, you're not bouncing between characters during chapters, no weird feature to farm orbs depending if players are online, the overall visual design of levels in DMC5 also has a lot to be desired. And lastly the bosses just get worse as the game goes on, even the Vergil fight is a lite alternative to his DMC3 counterpart.

DMCV is certainly the most fluid among the titles, DMC4 for all its issues was also very tight and fluid too, but it wasn't DMC3. DMC V heavily taking advantage of being the latest in the series by Itsuno's team but it's still a pacing nightmare along with a slew of above issues. Far from perfect. I listed way more when I did a thread break-down of DMCV and why I wasn't intending to go back anytime soon. It's probably my second favorite though, so for all my gripes I do like the game.

I just looked into it and does appear DMCV is now at six million, which is a decent sale count for its genre so I was wrong on that one at the very least, last I saw was about 2.5M which was my basis of criticism. Not that games selling 2 million is awful but it must be factored RE Engine games of that quality are far from cheap to make.

In interviews it has gone on record Itsuno san was the sole reason DMCV was even greenlit in the first place. He and his team are now busy on Dragon's Dogma 2 which probably won't come out till 2025, and I imagine with ARPGs being as big as they are will probably sell close to Monster Hunter numbers (15-20 million)

Sadly it's also worth knowing Itsuno intends to retire soon so DD2 is likely his final project. It's all very questionable if anyone else over at Capcom would fight for a DMCVI as he did for V. I'd love a sixth entry to fill in some of the cracks but it's probably not happening any time soon.

@masterkiller103: I understand, personally find a lot of modern games to enjoy but sadly a lot of big developers have gone against the gameplay aspect we seem to enjoy. Everyone has different preferences yet it would be nice if some of the growing developers/ publishers remembered the fandom that supported them as they built-up to begin with.

Truth is what was popular ten/ fifteen years ago isn't popular today. As a Survival Horror fan I've noticed it has been having a recent resurgence but if we talked about horror games during the early PS4/XB1 Survival Horror was a joke. Was all about Hide n' Seek Stealth Horror games like Outlast and Alien Isolation. Games such as Resident Evil went full-blown Gears of War just to try and remain relevant simply because Survival Horror wasn't profitable. I even recall many on the forums claiming 'they're outdated/ bad'. GS even did podcasts mocking Survival Horror games too. Tough time to be a fan, when The Evil Within hit roughly two people on this board even gave a dam (I was one of the two).

Maybe 3D Slashers will become big again, I'd like that, but it's looking like all the talent behind those games are even moving away from it in favor of more popular genres in 2022. As SilentChief noted though DMCV did sell pretty well looking into it but I'm not sure that has really made waves for other developers to take note or interest.

At its best you gotta just hope you still have your copies of these great 3D Slashers because they are great and very fun. I'm glad they bundled those Ninja Gaiden games into a package, would have liked OG Black and NG2 but I'll take what I can get lol.

Said it before, but...

Dante is a mess. No, I'm not getting good. They just smashed together everything, mechanics that worked well on their own but became a clusterfuck as they built on top of what was already there instead of redoing him. But fans expect the same thing from a sequel. Would have been nice if the player could pick and choose abilities from the different styles and then assign them to buttons other than mainly just Circle/B, so that they wouldn't have to switch styles at all. I would consider getting a controller with back pedals. I find cycling between four melee weapons and four projectile weapons clumsy. I know you don't have to have all the weapons on you, that you can carry just two for melee and two for projectiles, but it feels limiting. If I could have picked and chosen and have a mashup of styles in a single one, I would have just mapped the melee weapons to the D-pad, freeing up the triggers for other actions. Yes, that would have limited your projectile weapons, but I don't need so many projectile weapons in a hack and slash. His tools are mostly kind of lame, whether I'm sucking at the game myself or watching videos.

God of War reboot is mediocre, bordering on bad. Don't feel like copying and pasting my same wall of text again.

I enjoyed each and every one of them. They're all 9-10 for me. Except Ascension

god story(new ones) fine.

combat is not great

I love the story on gow 2018.

I’m not a big fan of gow, but I still played it and beat in 43 hours.

The story was amazing, I really enjoyed it.

Ragnorok had a great story, but not as good as 2018.

I still enjoyed the 58 hours it took me to beat it.

TLOU, is just an amazing game, story wise. I played part 1 four times already enjoyed every single play.

By far my favorite game hands down. And unlike every one else, I also loved part II

@RSM-HQ: I just loved the fact it had 4 different characters and each one felt amazing. The music was awesome as well and I actually really enjoyed the boss battles. My hope is the upcoming Anime on Netflix sparks interest and they bring us another. Dusk Golem( who has been a fairly reliable leaker) said another is in the very early stages of development.

Not against four characters if they all had separate campaigns but the fact that you are forcefully switched is one of the reasons people argue over the Sigma versions of Ninja Gaiden. It's highly considered bad pacing. DMC4 technically handled it better seeing as the first half is Nero and the later is Dante; DMCV was very flippy-floppy in that regard.

DMC3 has the benefit of being perfectly just Dante, with a Vergil mode as optional; DMC4 also had optional characters added in later editions too, Lady, Trish & Vergil.

Music was amazing in DMCV, minus Dantes theme wasn't a fan of that one. DMC4 & DMCV have the best overall music but I feel DMC3 set the tone for future games to follow.

The new God of War games are excellent. Complaining about things like walking segments that are part of the cut scenes is just silly. Those do not make up 95% of the actual game.

I had fun with them all until Ragnarok. Such an utter disappointment. They turned so many characters including Kratos himself into talky, whiny, emotional babies that all need to have their limelight to profess their feelings before the game is over, confess about something and apologize, push out some platitudes, whatever dumb dialogue you name it, it's got. Some would argue this is character development and a little bit is fine (God of War 2018 did it correctly: minimal dialogue), but Ragnarok goes wayyyy overboard with the talking and the feels that it definitely got me annoyed not even halfway through.

Then you got the Ironwood section which you can look up if you want more on that. I won't spoil that golden nugget of crap. You get to play as the son for several parts, and if all that doesn't tickle your whistle, tons of cinematics and walking and talking sections. God of War indeed.

Greatness awaits! /s

Had other issues outside the walk n' talk. But I feel constantly reflecting back on a game with criticisms many love is too cynical and counter productive to the intent of the forum, this is Games Discussion, not Game-Flaming. And trust me, I could roast up a storm on demand just as I did GoW: Ascension; but it's been done and I've said my peace regarding GoW(4).

If you enjoy the games however, that's all that matters. And the games do have many positive aspects despite the one I played not clicking with me personally.

Not every game is designed for every persons interest.

Sony games right now are the videogame equivalent of Disney.

Just like Marvel/SW are not great cinema, just visual spectacle for the masses, Sony's products in general aren't great games. They just flash the pretty graphics and casuals will call it the best thing ever.

Not to say that's all trash and that it can't still be entertaining.

@kathaariancode: Get what you mean to some extent but Returnal, R&C Future, Dreams and Astro's Playroom are all games with a ton of gameplay, don't follow the formula described, published/ funded by Sony, & all fairly recent.

Very curious what Team Asobi, Media Molecule, Housemarque, and Blue Point are working on. However I'd be lying if I cared for Naughty Dog or anyone following the 'Uncharted' template. We know Insomniac is running back to Marvel properties for some easy mula so I'm not expecting anything for me from them for awhile.

They took out gameplay and put in cutscenes... welcome to PS nowadays.

The game is awesome in many ways, but it just isn't particularly fun to me. Instead of the fluid, responsive combat of the older games, Kratos now moves slowly, attacks slowly, and is constantly harassed by enemies he cannot see due to the tunnel vision camera. So the gameplay consists of rolling around, rotating the camera to see surroundings instead of being able to simply enjoy the combat like the old games.

I think the open-world RPG aspect of it was okay. The settings are absolutely beautiful, and the evolved Kratos is a great character. But it doesn't feel quite open enough, and I didn't feel any desire to explore.

The series has a ton of potential if they can implement their evolved vision with the fun gameplay of the old games, and flesh out the open-world aspects more. As it stands, I don't think I can put it with my favorite games of the PS4 era

You also noticed how combat became slow?

@masterkiller103: One of the most noticeable things to me is how underpowered Kratos is compared to his past iterations. Much of the appeal of being the God of War was feeling immortal and overpowered. The new ones seem more Zelda-like, where you're wearing down enemy HP instead of obliterating their souls. You feel like much more mortal, which really goes against what the series has always been about.

Yeah i agree i don't think im even gonna play Nu-GoW 2 it doesn't feel the same, but do you recommend me playing it or not? And if you played it please tell me it's not one of those F****** RPG games. I F****** HATE RPG GAMES!